AUTHOR'S NOTE FOR THE AMERICAN EDITION

IT so happens that when I was first putting forth this little book, and wondering where it would find readers, my hopes fixed themselves chiefly on the United States; and I formed the ambition that "The New Word" should be born an American citizen. But the difficulty of finding any agent to whom I could confide the task of production proved too great to be overcome by correspondence, and I therefore committed it to the press in the republic of Geneva. Since it could not be born in the New World, I am glad that it should now obtain naturalisation.

In the few years that have gone by already the world's mind has been turning inside out so fast that I am reminded of a remark made by me to the first publisher to whom I showed the manuscript: "These thoughts are in the air; unless you bring out the book quickly half the things it says will no longer be new." Since then a series of scientific workers such as Curie, Thomson and Ostwald have been making discoveries, as it were, in confirmation of the argument: and it is right that I should put that forward as a ground for confidence in what of the prophecy yet remains unfulfilled.

Although, I am glad to find, no one has misunderstood the incidental part played in these pages by the Nobel bequest to Literature, it may be proper that I should acknowledge the new departure made by the Trustees last year in awarding this Prize, not to a celebrated author without reference to the character of his works, but to a book purporting to come within the class pointed out in this interpretation.

Once more I wish to thank the readers and reviewers, now becoming too many to be named separately, who have given so wholehearted a welcome to a book which came before them with such slight credentials.

The only criticism (of which I need take notice) so far made has been that the book afforded a glimpse, or outline, rather than a full expression of the author's mind. The world does not require to be told, however, that works involving long research and close meditation rarely can be undertaken by writers who are not assured of readers. Spencer, in the last century, adopted the plan of issuing a business prospectus of the Synthetical Philosophy, and soliciting orders in advance for the completed work. "The New Word" is my unbusinesslike prospectus,—should the orders never be forthcoming, perhaps hereafter it may serve as my apology.